Making Sense of COP28

Many of us were there advancing our priorities and like everybody else, eagerly awaiting to see what the final outcome of this COP would be. One of the things that one of the outcomes of COP was that several of us came home with colds or something else. And I'm certainly in that category. So I'll try to keep my comments brief in hopes of avoiding starting to cough or something in the middle of it. All right, so sort of the scene setting for the whole thing, I think, is everyone who's following what's happening with Earth's climate, or let's say, as everyone, period, should recognize at this point, the past year was remarkable.

And we've got a great panel to do that, starting with our President and CEO, Dr. Max Holmes. Also with us today, Dave McGlinchey, our Chief of Government Relations, Dr. Sue Natali, Senior scientist in our Arctic Program and Permafrost Pathways co lead, and Dr. Wayne Walker, our chief scientific officer. So we'll hear from them and then there will be an opportunity toward the end of the hour for you to ask your questions as well. You can go ahead and drop those if they occur to you. While you're listening to other answers and content, go ahead and drop those in the Q and A section and we'll get to those later in the hour. So Max, over to you just to kind of set the scene with our participation in COP this year.

Well, yeah, thanks, Heather, and thanks to everyone who's tuned in. We're excited to share our perspectives on cop, which as you'll hear, one the hottest year on record, impacts of climate change being felt near home in the US as well as globally. Again, whether that's heat or drought or extreme precipitation or wildfire, on and on and on, the impacts of climate change are here and are being felt by people around the world. And of course, that adds urgency to the negotiations. The conversations at cop, the conference, Conference of the Parties. Woodwell has been involved in these conferences from the start. So as you probably know, this was cop 28, the 28th cop, which are the Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. And Woodwell staff were actually involved in the drafting of the UNFCCC so many years ago and have been involved in all of the COPs since then. This year we had 16 staff participating at COP28 in Dubai. And for the first year we had our own meeting space, our own pavilion in the parlance of cops, where we could host discussions, host meetings. And also we had a separate meeting room, which was sort of wonderful to have and over the next hour, we'll tell you again both about the specific things that we're involved in at cop, as well as share our perspectives on the final outcome of cop, which was just released now a couple of days ago. And I think like everyone else, we're still trying to digest and understand the nuances of the wording and so on.

Okay, so you mentioned we're still digesting, so a little bit of a caveat there, but I think the big question on everyone's mind at this point is the, you know, just the big picture. Was this a success? And in your mind, what would be some of the. The markers of success coming out of this cop?

Yeah, that's the big question. And I think it's important probably to level step from the start. These things are always a mixed bag. Certainly the agreement that came out of this cop of cop 28 is not the one that Woodwell would have written if we had had that power to do so. Nor is it the agreement that any one of the hundreds or thousands of parties there would have written if they had that in their power. But the reality of COPPA is that any agreement that comes out of it is necessarily by consensus, and that's a very high bar. Nobody gets everything they want. And again, any words that come out of the copy only come out if everybody agrees to them. So they're. They're never as strong as we would like. I think also with this particular cop, people will recognize that there was a lot of controversy associated both with the selection of the location, United Arab Emirates, as well as the leader, the president of the cop, Sultan Al Jabbar, who is also the head of the national oil company in the uae. And that caused some controversy given the role of fossil fuels and causing the problem that we're facing. That being said, some really important commitments and agreements were made starting really on day one when there was an agreement to operationalize the loss and damage. We'll talk a little bit more about that later. But that's been something that's been in the works for a long time, and this was really a big accomplishment on day one. Essentially a mechanism by which the developed countries which are most responsible for the problem we're in, will help the developing countries deal with it, to compensate them for. To help them deal with it. There are some important commitments related to having oil and gas industry reduce methane emissions. That's a very important thing. And they've pledged to eliminate methane emissions by 2030 and also an agreement to triple renewable energy production by 2030. That's also incredibly important. And notably, as you may have been reading over the past few days, the final agreement did include wording related to transitioning away from fossil fuels in order to achieve net zero by 2050. So we've known from the start from COP1 that fossil fuels were a major cause of the problem we're in with respect to climate change. But the reality is that it wasn't until this cop, cop 28, that the words fossil fuel were actually recognized in the agreement. So depending on how you look at it, I mean, it is real late in the game. But I think it's important that this was finally recognized in the agreement that came out of this cop. And yet much more needs to be done. And words are not actions. And there are lots of areas in this agreement that are far weaker than would like. And when you really start to drill down in to the wording and the nuances, for example, even with respect to the wording about transitioning away from fossil fuels, it references transitioning away from, from fossil fuels in the energy systems. And it seems that that means in terms of electrical production and does not perhaps relate to transportation to automobiles and so on. So there's, so there's nuance there. There also wasn't mentioned, particularly in calling out the Arctic or permafrost, certainly areas that are of high priority for Woodwell. And the discussions about forests and ending deforestation weren't as strong as we would like. So there's lots of work that remains to be done. That all being said, I'm incredibly proud of the involvement of Woodwell staff at cop. We'll hear a lot more about sort of meetings that we catalyzed, discussions that we were involved in during the COP, and plans for how we'll keep pushing on these incredibly important issues moving forward.

Well, thank you, Max, and we'll give your voice a rest here for a minute. I would just want to say another welcome to those who've joined us in the past few minutes. We're up over 115 people who've joined us, so thank you and welcome to all of you. And Wayne, I'll go to you. Max already mentioned kind of wording around ending deforestation. And there's language throughout the decision that emphasizes the importance of forests and ecosystems. In fact, I've seen a couple of analyses that I have to admit surprised me a bit, saying this was really a pivotal COP for natural climate solutions and ecosystems, that they have a prominence in this decision they've never had before. And some of that includes language emphasizing the Importance of conserving, protecting and restoring nature and ecosystems, halting and reversing deforestation and forest degradation by 2030. The importance of conserving biodiversity, of recognizing all of the things that ecosystems do beyond storing carbon, recognizing the social and cultural value of these systems. So there's a lot that is actually in there. So I wonder, I guess, kind of a twofold question, your assessment of the significance of this language being included and then maybe you could dive into, as Max already alluded to as well. Right. With these decisions, it often comes down to really nitpicky, nuanced aspects of the wording. And in this case, we often talk about protecting, managing and restoring ecosystems for climate solutions. And they've got this language, protecting, conserving and restoring ecosystems. So I wonder what that might mean.

Sure.

Thanks, Heather. Well, I'll start with the last part of your question first and in sort of the nitpicky language, I think, broadly speaking, whether we're talking about conserving as they do or we're talking about managing better, which is the phrase we often use here, I think there's broad overlap between these terms. But obviously these terms, these phrases carry their own connotations, in some cases, baggage. Certainly the word management often carries a lot of baggage. And so they're chosen, you know, rather thoughtfully and purposefully in the context of these documents where you have, you know, some 200 countries that need to agree on their usage. In this context, you know, conserve, I think, refers to actions that are intended to avoid wasteful or destructive use. Sustainable use, sustainable management are terms that we often also use in a similar context. So again, I think there's broad overlap here. I would say regardless of the terms used, though I think the larger point that I would make is that there are these three broad categories or courses of action that exist and their prioritization is important. So if we use forests as an example, the first priority should be protection wherever possible. And here we're talking about again in the context of forest maintaining forest intact, especially mature no growth forests, which tend to contain large trees with considerable standing stocks of carbon and additional carbon sequestration capacity, as well as a whole host of ecosystem co benefits like biodiversity conservation and water cycling and temperature regulation. Second, we need to manage working forests better and this is where conservation or sustainable use comes into play. And so here the interpretation should mean, you know, with a climate benefit in mind. So for wherever possible, we need to implement practices that maximize the long term carbon storage capacity and hence climate benefit of these forests. So practices such as Reduced impact logging and extended harvest rotations are good examples of climate friendly forest management practices. And then third, where it makes sense ecologically, socially, economically, we need to restore forest. And of course, restoration is generally synonymous with tree planting, Right? And planting trees is important. Trees are the ultimate carbon capture and storage of machines. But, but young trees are inherently small machines, right? Meaning their real climate benefit will not be realized for decades or maybe even centuries. So no amount of tree planting can offset, you know, continued deforestation and forest degradation. So the prioritization of this protect, manage better and restore paradigm is really important. And then to your first question, sort of, what is the significance of this language at all? I would say its inclusion is significant because while the major headline, of course, of the agreement was this recognition of the need to transition away from fossil fuels, even though of course, we've long since known that, we know that that's not enough and it won't happen fast enough. And so, you know, nature has a tremendous role to play and efforts to implement nature based solutions to the climate crisis are to be encouraged together with biodiversity conservation and of course, with the appropriate environmental and social safeguards in place. And that's really what this section and sections like it are trying to emphasize the importance of, of bringing nature to bear in the mitigation conversation alongside of transitioning away from fossil fuels.

So, Dave, I want to go to you next because Wayne mentioned the need to implement these natural climate solutions. And that's where a lot of our work, both in Brazil and the DRC over the past several years has been. Democratic Republic of Congo, of course, being the second largest rainforest nation. And we were able to release a report jointly with DRC Ministry of Environment at this cop, which has roots in a couple of different places. Right. Long standing work in the drc, but then also work that you spearheaded a couple of years ago with the COP presidency to look at barriers to information, the need for climate risk information, and in fact, all of that shows up in this decision. The need for climate risk information for every country to have an assessment, and also the need for financial and other mechanisms to actually support countries in adapting to climate change and protecting their forests. So give us a little bit of, you know, the, the backstory of this report that we were able to release and how it was received at the meeting and maybe where that goes from here.

Yeah, thank you so much, Heather. As you said, this work, the report we released with the Democratic Republic of the Congo originally, the wheel started turning at COP26 when the UK, as COP26 president, prioritized risk and risk assessment as one of their main themes. And it's really nice to see kind of an initiative launched at one COP come to fruition at another. The continuum is satisfying, but the idea out of that, as you said, was that this risk information, this access to kind of understanding vulnerability, is not as widespread as it should be and as it needs to be if we're going to move forward on things like the global goal and adaptation. So our project was launched at COP26. It turned into this report we released with the DRC. But the other, the other real foundation of it, as you mentioned, was our longstanding work in country. We have an employee based in the drc, Joseph Zambo, who used to be a part of the Ministry of Environment and now he works with Woodwell Climate Research center. We also have Dr. Glenn Bush, who's worked in country for 15 years, developing trust, developing relationships. So we were able to really co produce this report. We were able to scope it at the front end, make sure that the science we were producing was going to be actionable, it was going to be really applicable to the DRC's needs. And so that's what, that's what we came out with. And as a result, no surprise, it was very well received because it was, you know, specifically tailored to the policy needs of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. And it was also satisfying to see that come out at COP28 because it really, it was the dovetailing of a number of different threads that I think were really relevant in this cop, including risk, including nature, as Wayne just discussed, and including finance, understanding risk, understanding the need for adaptation and kind of where it needs to be applied, and forced carbon stocks, how those can be integrated into global carbon markets. All of those are part of the financing conversation. So a lot of different threads at COP coming together in this one report, which we're very excited about and we look forward to working with the Congolese government to implement the findings.

Yeah, it was, I'll say, as a, as an audience member at a couple of those events, it was really exciting to hear the DRC's special presidential envoy, Stephanie Mbombo and others from the Ministry of Environment talking about their plans for a new climate economy and where forests and an understanding of risk really fit into that. So it was, it was really quite powerful and exciting and to your point. Yeah, just really hit on a number of themes that were very clear in the negotiations and come through very clearly in the decision as well. Max, if your voice is up for it, I wonder I think another interesting theme and really one of the, in my mind, incredible powers of these cops is the ability to bring people together from around the world that we wouldn't necessarily ever ask or be able to get together in a room at Woodwell or elsewhere. In the course of a few days, we had senators, a former president of Iceland, folks from DRC and from Brazil, high ranking, all in our space. And in particular, it's that conversation back and forth between Brazil and drc, these two rainforest nations, where I think there's been a lot of interest in our independent work in those two places. In hearing from the others, I wonder if you could speak to that a little bit. And Woodwell role in helping facilitate that.

Yeah, just a couple of maybe broader comments first, echoing a bit what you just said. But one of the amazing things about cop, so there, there are the formal negotiations, there's the formal agreement, but then there's this, this mass of people all focused on climate change and what to do about it. And I've heard different numbers from this cop, 70,000 or 100,000. I'm not sure what it was, but it was an awful lot of people from almost 200 countries. Scientists, policymakers, business people, indigenous people, youth activists, the whole range. So it's just this incredibly exciting buzz of people from different perspectives, but all kind of focused on climate change and what to do about it. So just from a diversity perspective, it's an amazing collection of some of the most interesting people I met were standing in the security line or something like that. So just interesting conversations strike up all over the place. One of the great things this year, as I mentioned at the start, we had our own space. We could control the programming and put together panels and, and so on and, and, and certainly one of those or several of those were related. Both the work that we do in the Amazon and in the Congo, the first and second largest rainforest on Earth, we have deep partnerships in both of those places. So to host our collaborators, our partners from the DRC and from the Amazon had discussions with them, either, you know, kind of offline or panel discussions. We're just rich in so many different ways. There are lots of similarities to the threats, the forces that impact their forests, that impact their livelihoods, that impact their indigenous people, but also interesting differences and we explored some of those. So yeah, I mean, I think it's just one of the examples where.

One.

Of the greatest powers of COP is this global convening of people thinking about climate change. And there's just no other place that gets these Wide range of people together.

Wayne in both Brazil and drc, a lot of our work in recent years has focused on mechanisms for incentivizing and supporting forest protection. And that can take a lot of different forms, as our research has revealed. From technical support to payment for performance systems, voluntary carbon markets come up. And then there's also, of course, some unique considerations around supporting indigenous communities who are incredibly powerful forest guardians. That's where I think a lot of your conversations at this COP were around how do we actually implement forest protection? So I'm curious, some of your takeaways where you maybe saw progress in those conversations around the actual mechanisms and particularly financial mechanisms.

Right.

Well, you sort of pointed to the fact that indigenous peoples have a huge role to play. And it's important to appreciate that, that indigenous peoples and local communities have, you know, an intimate relationship with their environment. And their reliance on local ecosystems leaves them, you know, on the one hand, disproportionately affected by the consequences of climate change. On the other hand, though, they, they have this role, right, in implementing natural climate solutions like tropical forest protection. And that's, that's something that's very widely recognized. And so compensation is needed if they're to, you know, overcome the impacts of loss and damage while also being able to continue being the effective stewards of the landscapes and ecosystems where they live in. In the opening plenary of, of the cop, which is sort of the, the large sort of open forum where, where, you know, many different categories of representatives are given an opportunity to speak, the Indigenous Peoples Caucus was given two minutes, just two minutes to, to voice their, their core concerns. And among other things, you know, they called for the direct access to funds specifically in the context of loss and damage. But direct access to funds is, is a broader theme among indigenous organizations. You know, they, they don't want other entities, whether it be environmental NGOs or foundations, telling them what they can or should do with money that they don't actually have control of. So this is fundamentally about the right to self determination. So with, with all of this in mind, Woodwell has been partnering increasingly with organizations like Health and Harmony and Pawanka Fund who are really strong advocates of indigenous self determination. Pawanka entities, whether it be environmental NGOs or foundations, telling them what they can or should do with money that they don't actually have control of. So this is fundamentally about the right to self determination. So with, with all of this in mind, Woodwell has been partnering increasingly with organizations like Health and Harmony and Good Fund is, is a really great example of an indigenous led fund that provides direct support to Indigenous initiatives focused on promoting and protecting traditional knowledge, well being, rights and and self determined solutions to a whole host of issues including food security, health care and climate change. And so we see organizations like Palonka Fund is really, really critical if Indigenous peoples are to be properly and directly compensated for their contributions to climate change mitigation. Because there needs to be this important mechanism to channel funds directly to them so that they can be responsible for implementing the solutions that they feel are most appropriate and most effective.

I think that's a nice segue over to you Sue. Obviously working with Alaska Native communities and co production of knowledge, supporting self determination in adaptation efforts in those communities has been a big focus of permafrost pathways over the past couple of years. So I'm curious, in heading to cop kind of what were some of your top priorities trying to get on the agenda at cop?

Yeah, thanks Heather. We had a few priorities heading into this. I mean Arctic permafrost, cryosphere are definitely underrepresented in the COP conversations. And while there was a reference to cryosphere and cover text, there really wasn't any elaboration or focus on the urgency of these implications. And so we had a few priorities going into this. Some focused on supporting increased mitigation, supporting integration of science, and then also third focused on adaptation and resilience, loss and damage. And so in terms of their first priority was highlighting the implications of thawing permafrost. And really the goal of this was to support mitigation and increase ambition. And this is important because permafrost can consume about 20% of our remaining carbon budgets such as following permafrost. And really the goal of this was to support mitigation and increase ambition. And this is important because permafrost can consume about 20% of our remaining carbon budgets to avoid 1.5C. It will be much more, much greater emissions from permafrost if we overshoe 1.5C. And that's I'd say is increasingly likely. That's probably an understatement. I'd say it's, it's to avoid 1.5 C. It will be much more. Much. Yeah, I think we, we're heading or we're heading there and so greater emissions from permafrost if we overshoe 1.5C. And that's I'd say is increasingly likely. That's probably an understatement. I'd say it's, it's. So as Max and others mentioned like there definitely was some progress in the language coming out of this cop. There was language about transitioning away from fossil fuels to achieve net zero in 2015. Keeping with the science. But a couple of thoughts on this. There's been a lot of like celebration of the fact that the word fossil fuels was in the, in the Cobb text. And honestly I feel like our bar is set so low if we think, yeah, I think we, we're heading or we're heading there and so that's an achievement. But also I think the, the language really doesn't reflect the science. The science supports much more drastic cuts and much more urgent actions and much stronger goal posts. So from the last IPCC report was set out was though as Max and others mentioned, like there definitely was some progress in the language that we need to, you know, 43% greenhouse gas emission cuts by 2030 benchmark and that was not part of the COP tax. And then the other priority, which is related, a second priority, was to ensure that decisions were supported by the best available science and that includes Western science, but also indigenous knowledge and integration of Western science and indigenous knowledge and then also increase international collaboration on Arctic science, which is a real challenge in light of the coming out of this cop. There was language about transitioning away from fossil fuels in a geopolitical situation. And so right now, permafrost thought processes, despite the fact that they're going to use up a lot of our remaining carbon budgets aren't fully represented in global climate models. In some cases they're not represented at all. So this carbon budgets for 1.5 thresholds are to achieve net zero in 2015, keeping with the science. But a couple of thoughts on this. There's been a lot of celebration of the fact that the word fossil fuels was in the COP text. And honestly I feel like our bar is set so low if we think that's an achievement. But also I think the language really doesn't reflect the science. The science supports much more drastic cuts and much more urgent actions and much stronger goalposts. So from the last IPCC report, what was set out was that we need to, you know, 43% greenhouse gas emission cuts by 2030 benchmark and that was not part of the COP tax. And then the other priority which is related, a second priority was to ensure that decisions were supported by the best available science and that includes Western science, but also indigenous knowledge and integration of Western science and indigenous knowledge and then also increased international collaboration on Arctic science, which is a real challenge in light of the current geopolitical situation. And so right now, permafrost thought processes, despite the fact that they're going to use up a lot of our remaining carbon budgets aren't fully represented in global climate models. In some cases they're not represented at all. So this carbon budgets for 1.5 thresholds are somewhat flawed because of that. And so in terms of the COP28 outcomes, I think there was insufficient attention to the science, even the best available science that we have. And I don't think there was enough attention to important feedbacks and tipping points from Lafrosta being one of them.

You also mentioned the importance of co production of knowledge and I was interested to see in the final decision there are multiple mentions and I feel like that is an increase in attention to the importance of indigenous knowledge in decision making. But as Wayne just alluded to, that doesn't necessarily come through in the actual negotiations. And one place where I'd be curious to get your take on this is around the loss and damage conversation.

Right.

Big announcement on the first day of the meeting. Operationalizing loss and damage, a really significant win. But that's been a conversation that's been really centered on global south developing nations, small island developing states. And I know you've been trying to get Arctic communities better, better represented, expand that conversation around loss and damage a bit. Was there any progress on that front?

Front in terms of support for loss and damage impacts on indigenous communities of the North? I'd say not a lot. And I just want like people to realize the communities in the north have been dealing with this for decades and like literally loss of land. So loss land that's sinking, land that's falling into rivers and land that's falling into the ocean. This is already after their land had been taken due to colonization. And so these communities who already have very limited land are losing it to permafrost thaw, to wildfire, to increase storm impacts. And so this has been going on for a really long time and they urgently need resources. The loss of damage fund, yes it was operationalized, but it is not geared towards, it's geared towards helping countries in the Global south, not to indigenous peoples of the north who are, who have been impacted for a long time. And I would also say the funding commitments, I was like pleased to see that this is being operationalized, but it is nowhere near sufficient to what's needed. And there's no indication of how Arctic communities can be part of a, part of the Arctic, Indigenous communities in particular.

Okay, so clearly not as much progress as we would like. Certainly on the Core decision front. But you had some really exciting events there. And we were talking about also the importance of COP in terms of the convening power and the ability to accelerate our own work. And this is a long fight. So I'm curious if you feel like there was progress made on that level with our work and our ability to continue moving this work from forward.

Yeah, I will say I think it was great that Woodwell had a pavilion. It provided us a space to bring people together to coordinate panels, which panel is not just a panel, but it's the conversations that happened before and the collaborations that happened afterwards. And so we had a number of events at Woodwell's pavilion as well as the International Climate Cryosphere Initiatives Pavilion. And this was a great opportunity for us to build collaborations and develop some new partnerships, including we had representatives from the Icelandic government, so former President Grimson of Iceland. We had high ranking officials from Iceland, from the US Government, which was great. A lot of opportunities to engage with partners, indigenous partners mostly from Alaska and Canada, representing the Inuit Circumpolar Council, the Arctic Athabascan Council. So I felt like there was a lot, much more, much more time to develop those relationships at this cop. And it might have come from having, you know, Woodwell having their pavilion there, but. But I felt like there's some really deep relationship building that happened. And then the other thing that I thought was great was that Woodwell's pavilion was visited by US Senators Ed Markey and Lisa Murkowski. I was not there at the time, I had already left. But Dave met with them and talked quite a bit about the urgency of addressing impacts of permafrost thaw. So maybe Dave, if you want to chime in about those conversations.

Yeah, Dave. And I think more broadly, when we think about UN COP mines immediately go to national, international level. But there's a lot of subnational representation and we really saw that with engagement with US federal and state level policymakers at this cop. So share a little bit of that.

Yeah, absolutely. Heather and Sue's right. So we had visits from Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts and Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, and they were two of the higher profile members of Congress who visited Dubai. But by no means were they the only ones. There was a delegation from the Climate Solutions Caucus in the House of Representatives. There were a variety of other elected officials, but their presence there is a really interesting development and it's a legacy of the Trump administration because when Donald Trump, President Trump pulled the United States out of the Paris agreement and minimized U.S. engagement in the COP process. A number of members of Congress stepped forward to kind of attend COP and by doing so indicate that the US Was still, you know, at least one branch of the US Government was still very committed to this process and very interested in engaging. Obviously, the United States has now re engaged from the executive branch, but these congressional delegations are still happening and they're really interesting. They draw a crowd. People are interested in what they're going to say. People want to hear their perspectives on US Policy. The amount, the kind of level of political literacy for US Issues from people from other countries is remarkable. They're very locked in on US Policymaking and what's going to happen next. As sue mentioned, both of those officials, Senator Markey and Senator Murkowski, were very, very interested in permafrost thaw because they get it. They understand the massive amount of carbon stored in permafrost and they understand the kind of implications for global carbon budgets and they also understand the implications for local communities. So they, they get the whole scope of the problem. And while it is not sufficiently represented in the negotiations, it certainly is something that is on the mind. As Max said, there's this outer concentric circle outside the negotiations of the kind of the conversation that caught beyond that. And there permafrost and Arctic issues are very present, not sufficiently in the negotiations, but certainly in the outer, outer circle.

Thank you. So I'm looking at the time here, and we do have some questions in the Q and A that I want to turn to everyone else. And if you joined us later and didn't get the instructions already, if you want to put questions in the Q and A, we do have time for audience questions and would love to try to get to as many of those as possible. And Max, I'm going to throw this first one to you, quoting the the question here. Jim Hansen recently said 1 5C is debtor than a doornail and that anyone who claims otherwise is lying. So your response to that where do we stand in terms of setting appropriate and realistic goals? Is is 1.5 still the the goalpost?

So I think it was sue that mentioned earlier that it is highly likely that we are going to blow by 1.5. And I certainly agree with that. I won't accuse anybody of lying if they have a different perspective on that. But I think if you really know where the science is and look at where emissions are right now and what they're likely to be over the next few years, I think you would agree that again, it's Incredibly likely that we'll go by 1.5. So where does that leave us? I mean we're at about 1.2 degrees C warming since the start of the pre industrial period right now. And as we've already discussed, we're already seeing really big impacts of the climate change associated with that degree of warming. It's impacting certainly it's impacting us in the us it's impacting people globally and it's already costing lives and livelihood. So every additional increment of warming has additional consequences for people around the world. So there's every incentive to put the brakes on as quickly as we can. 1.2 is better than 1.3, which is better than 1.4 and so on and so forth. So if we go by 1.5, it's all lost. Do we just give up and forget about it? Absolutely not. And the way I think about it is it needs to be a two way road. We're again, we're probably going to see 1.5 on the way up, but then we need to slam on the brakes and start bringing it down the other side and at some point in the Future Cross that 1.5 heading the other direction so that we can end up with a climate where everyone in the world can have the opportunity for.

A.

Healthy livelihood, a sustainable future and so on.

So maybe related to that, I think we've got a number of questions here that are kind of in the reality check for realm, right? We've mentioned a lot of commitments that are in the decision that were announced during the course of this cop, and a lot of them have 2030 as a deadline. So a reduction in methane emissions by 2030, a tripling of renewable energy by 2030, end of deforestation by 2030. How realistic I guess are really any of those that's, you know, six years away at this point. And given our track record, how much credence should we give to 2030 pledges? And I might, you know, open this up. Who wants to take a stab at that? Because there's a lot of different ones that, that different folks may, may have thoughts on.

I'll offer one thought, then others can jump in. I'll say I'm very glad that we're making commitments for only six years out. When commitments are made for 2050 or 2100, everybody, you know, you don't have to worry about it for a long time. These very short term commitments, as you said, I mean it's amazing that 2030 is only six years away or something like that. Every year, every month there's going to be a focus on that. We can talk about whether those commitments will be met or not. And it will be a huge challenge to do so in many cases. But we're not going to forget about it until 2029. The focus will be on every year, every month, every day, every build on.

Go ahead, Wayne.

Sorry.

I can just say a few words about deforestation. Yes, six years is a very short period of time. Although if we look back over the last six years, we've seen tremendous strides made in countries like Indonesia and countries like Brazil. So it is possible, it is possible that a lot can happen over the next six years. But you know, it comes down to ambition, it comes down to political will, it comes down to investment, and, and we'll see where we get. But it's, it's, it's not impossible, Dave.

And I would just add that in terms of the shorter timeline, a lot of the pledges that were made around methane leakage reduction are achievable in the short term. That's, you know, it's been referred to a number of times at cop 28 as the low hanging fruit. Essentially it's plumbing, it's getting the leaks taken care of. It's being responsible in that approach. So that's those methane commitments, if they're actually followed through on, are achievable on that timeline. It takes investment and it takes monitoring to make sure that the follow through happens, but it can be done.

So while we're on methane, I will jump to another question, question which sue, you already hit on, but I think maybe some incredulity and desire for clarification here. Is it really true that methane emissions from permafrost thaw are not incorporated into climate modeling used for determining various pathways to meet global mean temperature goals? So, yeah, fire away.

So the last IPCC report was the first time that permafrost feedbacks were included in the Earth system models that went into the report. But only two of the models included permafrost carbon feedback and that's both methane and CO2 emissions from thawing permafrost. And then the two that did include it, some important processes that really speed up greenhouse gas emissions from permafrost. So this rapid ground collapse and wildfire and even combustion of carbon below ground wildfire more in any of the two models. And essentially, you know, there's a number of system models that go into this form, essentially average it, right? So when you have a really small percentage and they're not including the full processes, then you're not doing the full, the full accounting. So yes, that is indeed true, fortunately. And let me just say, like, and it's. I do want to say the modeling community is aware of it and is and is working on it. Definitely needs to be. If this is important and this is a commitment, there needs to be then funding to support this, to support the people and support this community to do this. It's not that the scientific community isn't aware of it. There just isn't the right now hasn't been the will, I'd say, in the funding mechanisms and then as a result the capacity to do it. All right.

Wayne, there's a question here that I wonder if you want to tackle. What are the prospects for rewilding barren landscapes and using regenerative agriculture, forestry, to reduce greenhouse gases and increase biodiversity? This intersection of food production and ecosystem protection was a huge theme at this cop. And that of course, all ties into the idea of sustainable development and natural climate solutions. So what are the prospects there?

I would say there are tremendous prospects at this cop. We held a number of different events and panel discussions specifically on regenerative agriculture. We have work going on here in that area, a couple of different scientists working in places like India and elsewhere in the western United States exploring.

You.

Know, the prospects associated with regenerative agricultural practices for, you know, not only impacting climate mitigation, but increasing yields, having an impact on food production. So I think there's a lot of prospects there where rewilding is concerned and restoration is concerned. There's certainly important work to be done there as well. I would say, you know, echoing one of the comments made earlier, where restoration is concerned, we need to appreciate that in terms of climate benefit, there's, there's only so much that can be realized over the short term. That doesn't mean that that work shouldn't be done because it does have important implications outside of of just the, the climate benefit where biodiversity is, is concerned, for example, and other ecosystem service benefits. But, but it takes time. Restoration, rewilding takes, takes time. But, but the prospects are actually are absolutely there and, and are certainly real. So all important work to be done.

We've got a couple of process questions that Dave, I might throw your way, just kind of about how COP in this whole process works, how countries are held accountable, whether there are rules for actually implementing the agreements that are made, whether there are intermediate meetings between these big annual headline meetings. So can you just give us a little bit of an outline of how what the process is here for actually trying to turn these agreements into action.

Yeah, absolutely, Heather. So when COP was when the Paris Agreement was put in place, every country made national commitment, referred to as the nationally determined contribution. And within that, so there were initial commitments. And it was widely covered that those initial commitments did not in fact keep us under 1.5 or 2 degrees, which were the Paris Agreement targets. But built into the Paris Agreement was this, what's referred to as a ratchet mechanism, where every five years countries come back and increase their ambition. So on the nest, ratchet mechanism round countries are supposed to increase their ambition in line with this most recent consensus statement. The question about enforcement though is the critical one because if you look at the commitments that were made previously, they're not being met. We're not tracking. Even those ambitions that were not sufficient are not being met. And there's no Paris Agreement is a voluntary commitment. There's no enforcement mechanism, there's no teeth to it. So really incumbent on kind of the, the pressure from the rest of the world, the you know, collective will of, of countries to, to push forward. But we've seen that that hasn't gotten it done to date. It's, it's unfortunate, but I think what it says to us is that this is a very useful mechanism in terms of understanding where, where the world is, where, where kind of collective agreement is in terms of climate change. But we need more aggressive national level policies to actually meet these targets.

So to that point, and I'm looking at the time here that We've got about 10 minutes left in the hour and would like to wrap up a few minutes before the top of the hour to let folks get to their next two o' clock if they have one of those. We've got a few questions along the lines of kind of what comes next? How do we make progress locally? What are we Woodwell doing to actually make sure that these commitments get seen through? And so I'll just, we can. Each of you, each of you gets a stab at this one. But maybe what's one thing that you'll be doing or looking for in the coming year between this COP and the next one? And Max, I'll go to you first.

Maybe I'll start with sort of addressing the question about what about the local stuff and what about buildings? Kind of touch that together. And so I'm sitting here in the, on the campus of the Woodwell Climate Research Center. You can't see out that window window, but if you could, you'd see a wind turbine. If you could see the top of our building and our front lawn, you'd see solar panels. So and if you knew about the construction of this building would tell you a story about how it's super insulated and triple paned windows and, and everything else. So we strive to produce all the energy that we need on campus. Any energy that we need to import from the grid comes from renewable sources. My car is plugged into a cord out front so we encourage staff and we have plenty of charging stations and so on. So we try to walk the walk when it comes to issues related to climate change and to bring home the lessons that we learn globally and when we're thinking about global climate change and what to do about to our local area.

Sue, I'll, I'll hand it to you next and I know you've got a list a mile long of things that you're working on. So we, maybe not the whole list but give us, give us the top of the list.

I'll give you a couple. I raised like I can't say one thing but I mean one, the first thing is just doing quality science, right like doing the science to fill the gaps that we have in under inner understanding of critical feedbacks to global climate from the North. So that involves monitoring and modeling and working with community, our, our team here at Woodwell but also internationally to, to push the science forward. Like that is really first and foremost the work that we do and then working with our policy partners at, at Harvard and and elsewhere to how do we get this information that we have in the hands of policymakers. So those are two areas where we are really active and then alongside that is working with our Alaska Native partners and also Indigenous communities at the pan Arctic scale. But thinking about, in the US really thinking about commitments are good but it really comes down to implementation and that has to do with finance. It also has to do with the governance framework and working this out with our partners of like what does adaptation governance look like? Like and what is just an equitable adaptation governance framework look like which means being led by the communities that are most impacted by the Indigenous communities of the North. And so thinking about that and working with government agencies and government officials and tribal leaders and Indigenous knowledge holders and scientists and sort of bringing all of these different ways of knowing and these different expertises together to really push forward that agenda.

All right, well done. Condensing a whole lot of work into a very concise answer there. Wayne, over to you. Some, some of your plans, not, not the entirety but some of your plans for the coming year.

Sure. Well, I'll just mention one item and, and it's, it's focused on carbon markets. We didn't talk a lot about carbon markets in our discussion today, but carbon markets certainly featured prominently at the cop. We and others think carbon markets hold tremendous potential for bringing large amounts of capital to the ground, to the people and to the places responsible for implementing natural climate solutions. But there's no question that right now carbon markets are plagued with all sorts of problems. They're very much in their infancy as markets go. And there's a lot of work to be done if they're to function properly, sustainably, equitably. But we think our science has a significant role to play. And so we're really looking forward over the next several months to exploring opportunities to bring integrity and confidence to these markets.

And I think that speaks to a couple of other late breaking questions that came into the Q and A around how do we actually get money where it needs to, to go in order to support what we've now collectively agreed needs to happen? Obviously not the only mechanism, but as you alluded to, one with a lot of potential that needs a lot of attention and a lot of fleshing out. So Dave, over to you.

Yeah, I'll just echo what I said earlier, which is that I'll be closely watching the development of national level climate policies because that's where the rubber hits the road. These high minded NDCs are excellent, they're ambitious, their target setting. But the national level policy is where they become reality. In the United States will be closely focused on the farm bill. There's a lot of climate aspects to that in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Wayne just mentioned carbon markets. They're in the process of developing a regulatory agency for carbon markets in that country. So there's a lot of work going on across the world at the national level that will make these NDCs, these national targets actually become real or not. So that's where I'll be focused.

Great. Well, thank you all. And I think just those four answers, and as Max already alluded to, we had 16 people from Woodwell participating, not all 16 of them, obviously here today that would have been a little bit much in terms of a panel. So you're getting just a smattering. And even in that really the breadth of the work going on from right on our own campus and thinking about our own carbon footprint to the science that we do, working to figure out how we can support finance mechanisms that make things go and federal policies that point us in the right direction. So a lot of really exciting work to come, and I'm having a moment as an NPR baby here. I'm going to quote my favorite NPR show. Wait, wait, don't tell me. If any of that happens, you'll hear about it right here from us. If you're you've joined us for this webinar, so you're probably already following us either on email or on social media. But if you're not already and you heard about this through a friend or happenstance, we encourage you to sign up for our newsletter, follow us on social, and stay in touch. Thank you all for joining us today and have a wonderful weekend.